The present invention relates to a heating and/or air conditioning system for a plurality of subspaces in an interior of a vehicle, including at least one of a driver's footwell, a front passenger's footwell, and a rear footwell, with a central air-conveying and/or air-conditioning device which is designed for at least one of heating, cooling, drying, cleaning, humidifying, and conveying air, having at least one fan, a heat exchanger and an evaporator, and which can be switched between a plurality of operating modes, and a decentralized air-conveying device which has a plurality of air-conveying units arranged in the vehicle interior.
German publication DE 198 14 581 A1 discloses an air conditioning system having a central refrigerant module arranged in an engine compartment. In addition to the central refrigerant module, a plurality of decentralized heat transfer units are distributed in the vehicle interior. Air is supplied to the heat transfer units via air ducts, a central fan in each case supplying one or more heat transfer units. The fan is arranged centrally either in the region of the A-pillar or in the region of the C-pillar. The heat transfer units are connected to a common heating circuit. A disadvantage here is that a piping arrangement which is structurally complicated and also energetically unfavorable, because it is loss-afflicted, is required in order to connect the decentralized units.
German publication DE 196 25 927 A1 shows a device for heating or cooling a vehicle, in particular a bus. The device has a central heat exchanger and, in addition, a plurality of heat exchangers which are distributed in the interior of the bus and in each case heats up or cools some sections of the interior. The heat exchangers are connected to one another via a common heating circuit and are charged with air by a central fan via air ducts.
The disadvantages here are the piping arrangement, which is likewise structurally very complicated, and the relatively indefinite possibility of setting the temperature since it concerns a very large section of the interior.
One object of this invention is to provide a heating and/or air conditioning system for a vehicle interior which is constructed in a structurally simple manner and can preferably be readily regulated. In particular, the heating and/or air conditioning system is to have a low energy consumption and permit efficient air conditioning.
This object is achieved according to the invention by a heating and/or air conditioning system in which respective air-conveying units of a decentralized air-conveying device are arranged in a plurality of subspaces in the vehicle interior. In at least one operating mode, the central air-conveying and/or conditioning device feeds ingoing air into the vehicle interior and removes outgoing air, and the air-conveying units of the decentralized air-conveying device circulate air in respective subspaces.
The interior of a vehicle, for example a passenger vehicle or bus, is, as a rule, constructed with a lot of cavities and has a plurality of internal components, for example seats or partitions, which divide the interior into a plurality of subspaces. Subspaces of this type may, for example, be a driver's footwell and/or a front passenger's footwell and/or a rear footwell on the right-hand side or left-hand side or the space behind a seat back in buses. The invention envisages arranging a respective air-conveying unit of a decentralized air-conveying device in a plurality of these subspaces for circulating circulating air. In addition, a central air-conveying and/or air-conditioning device is provided which can be arranged, for example, at a central point in the engine compartment or in the cockpit region. This device charges the vehicle interior with conditioned ingoing air, in particular fresh air or outside air, and/or removes used outgoing air. The central air-conditioning and/or air-conveying device may comprise a fan and/or a heat exchanger and/or an evaporator and/or a filter for preparing and/or conveying the air.
The decentralized air-conveying device is designed in such a manner that the circulation of the circulating air and/or of the outside air takes place within one or more subregions of the vehicle interior. A loss-afflicted guidance of the circulating air via long air ducts with high flow resistance is therefore avoided. Air ducts can therefore be omitted, and the heating and/or air conditioning system can be designed very compactly.
The decentralized air-conveying device circulates the circulating air and/or the outside air within the associated subregions of the interior, the individual subflows of the subregions being largely separated from one another. An undesired mixing of air can therefore largely be avoided.
Provision is made, in particular, for each of the decentralized air-conveying units to have an air inlet opening and an air outlet opening for feeding in and removing circulating air. Air inlet opening refers to the opening through which air flows into the interior of the vehicle, and air outlet opening refers to the opening through which air is removed from the interior. The air inlet opening of a decentralized air-conveying unit is connected to the air outlet opening of the same air-conveying unit via a short, locally delimited and closed air duct, the air-conveying unit being arranged in the air duct between the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening. In order to obtain a guide for the air which is as short as possible and is therefore of low resistance, the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening of an air-conveying unit can be arranged spatially adjacent, in particular situated next to one another, in a subspace.
One design envisages installing the air-conveying unit in a seat, in particular in the backrest or seat cushion of a seat, the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening facing the footwell, which is situated behind the seat, so that the footwell can be ventilated. In addition, some of the air can be used for ventilating, in particular for heating and/or cooling, the backrest and/or the seat surface of the seat by guiding some of the air along the surface of the seat cushion or along the surface of the backrest.
A further design envisages the air-conveying unit being arranged in the region of the dashboard, in the driver's or front passenger's footwell, so that the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening in each case face the driver's footwell or the front passenger's footwell, so that the driver's footwell or the front passenger's footwell can be ventilated.
In an advantageous design, provision is made for the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening to be arranged situated next to one another in the subspaces in such a manner that the air-conveying unit forms a closed circulating-air flow in the form of a cylinder or a roller. Provision is made, in particular, for each of the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening to have a rectangular base surface with a short transfer extent and a long longitudinal extent. The length of the longitudinal extent preferably determines the width of the roller-shaped flow. Provision can be made, in particular, for the air inlet opening and the air outlet opening to have essentially the same longitudinal extent or, since the air flow widens in its profile, provision is made for the air outlet opening to have a greater transverse extent than the air inlet opening.
In one design, provision is made for the heating and/or air conditioning system to have a plurality of switchable operating modes, such as, for example, heating operation and/or cooling operation and/or outside-air operation and/or circulating-air operation and/or defrosting operation. The central air-conveying and/or air-conditioning device conveys outside air in at least one operating mode and feeds it into the vehicle interior as ingoing air or outside air which is conditioned in a manner which can be set in advance in accordance with the desired interior climate. This means, for example, that in winter cold outside air has to be greatly heated up or in the summer hot outside air has to be greatly cooled, for which purpose a correspondingly high expenditure of energy is required in each case.
In order to provide a pleasant interior climate in the vehicle with little expenditure of energy, already preconditioned interior air is therefore advantageously used for air conditioning purposes; this is referred to as circulating-air operation. However, this circulating air has the disadvantage that it becomes, as a rule, quite moist very rapidly, in particular when vehicles are fully occupied. This interior air can therefore only be used in the region of the footwell, since otherwise an impairment in the comfort of the occupants occurs or, given an appropriate outside temperature, the windows could become misted from the inside.
The central air-conveying and/or air-conditioning device conveys the outside air into the upper region of the interior or removes it therefrom. The decentralized air-conveying device circulates the circulating air in the lower region of the interior, so that a layering of the air is formed. The conditioned, in particular dry outside air is arranged in the upper region of the interior and the circulating air is arranged in the lower region of the interior. Mixing of ingoing air and circulating air, which is undesirable because it causes misting of the windows, is therefore largely avoided in the vehicle interior.
In order to condition the circulating air, an air-conveying unit or a plurality of air-conveying units of the decentralized air-conveying device can have a heating and/or cooling device, preferably with Peltier elements. Provision is made for the heating and/or cooling device to be individually controllable, so that the temperature and/or air humidity and/or air speed can be set individually in one or more subspaces.
In one advantageous design, an air-conveying unit or a plurality of air-conveying units of the decentralized air-conveying device can be designed as a “disc fan”. The disc fan has a rotating assembly comprising a plurality of parallel discs of small thickness, in which two discs in each case bound an air gap lying in between. The disc fan can be designed, in particular, in such a manner that the intake direction and blow-off direction lie in one plane. By means of this construction, the disc fan promotes, in particular, the design of stable and inherently closed flow rollers. It is likewise of advantage that the disc fan has, owing to its type of construction, only a very low noise level, so that complicated sound-damping measures which are afflicted by flow losses can be reduced or can be entirely omitted. The low level of noise constitutes an advantage in terms of comfort for the arrangement of the disc fan in the interior.
In one design, the disc fan can be designed as a heating and/or cooling device. Individual discs of the disc fan can be designed to be electrically conductive or can have an electrically conductive coating, so that the discs can be heated electrically. Provision is similarly made for individual discs of the disc fan to have one or more Peltier elements or to be designed as such, and therefore to be electrically heatable and/or coolable.
Further features and embodiments of the invention will be apparent from the claims, the figures and the description of the figures. The features and combinations of features which are mentioned above and are described below can be used not only in the respectively stated combination, but also in other combinations or on their own without departing from the scope of the invention.
Further designs of the invention are illustrated and explained in the figures.